Reanimation
by dillpops
Summary: [One Shot] Short piece set the day after Pailong is freed from Jun’s control. Focuses on the new situation they have found themselves in and the new feelings that appear between Pailong and his former Master.


Well, my first Shaman King story here. I apologise in advance for any mistakes etc. since I've only watched the dub due to the fact no other versions are available here in the UK on TV and the only manga shop near me is around an hour and a half away. So...bare with me.  
  
I decided to write this piece because I was very intrigued by Jun's and Pailong's relationship. I'm not sure about romanization so I'll use Pailong as a lot of fictions seem to use. Also using Ren as her brother's name, aren't the Tao family of Chinese descent? I thought Ren sounded more...descended from Chinese? No idea what that's all about. So: Jun, Li Pailong and Ren.  
  
Anyway, it seemed strange that only ten minutes after being ready to kill Jun he became her guardian ghost, zombie, whatever. So...this story just popped into my head as a way for me to explore the aftermath that wasn't shown. Anyway, enough of me talking, I think the story's purpose will become clearer as it goes on. This is aimed as a one shot but you never know, it might continue. I'm unpredictable like that.  
  
Anyway, one shot, how Jun and Pailong came to an understanding.  
  
Disclaimer: I don't own any of Shaman King or it's characters etc. So...don't sue ;;  
  
Jun picked up the last of her clips and pulled the final strands of hair up to be tamed. Staring into the mirror in the dim light of her bedroom her reflection looked pale and wan, dark patches under eyes indicated the lack of the previous nights sleep. Jun had lain awake after returning from her failed mission, wired and exhausted at the same time.  
  
Her control had broken over Li Pailong. As unbelievable as it seemed to her. The gift she had been given at birth of a loyal servant had been taken away from her. But now he was free had she had met the true Pailong did she really care? However, no longer was she Jun: powerful and a favorite of the Tao family. She was Jun: a failure and awaiting her family judgment. The family did not tolerate failure, but she would have to wait to see who would be sent next to replace her in helping Ren or if she was to be punished for failure and retrained.  
  
Jun scowled at her reflection and stood up. She had suspected her servant had been born from murder due to the circumstances of his death, even though it was kept from her due to the distressing nature to a child that her family murdered a man to give to her. He had come from death, of course she had known that, he was a corpse, but the family had always kept the true nature of their sorcery and their sources a deep secret until the child had become of a reasonable age. Li Pailong had been shot to be given to her at birth, his soul captured in a dead body by a spell, unable to leave and unable stop himself from following her bidding, even if it was attacking innocent people. Like last night. Jun replayed the battle against Yoh Asakura in her mind once more. He had done no wrong, only been friends with his spirit and had entered the Shaman contest. He had committed nothing more and she had attacked him mercilessly and ridiculed his friendship with his spirit.  
  
Jun did want Ren to win the Shaman Tournament and wanted to help him win but she was now beginning to realize perhaps her interference was not the best way to go about it.  
  
She ought to have followed Yoh's example in forging a partnership with her guardian.  
  
Her hands felt dirty, from keeping a noble spirit like Pailong's on Earth within a body for over a decade without his permission. Never before had she thought about it until he had tried to murder her in rage last night. No wonder he had wanted to kill her. She would too but wondered why she'd never realized it before, perhaps her Uncle's teaching had always stopped her thinking of such things. Jun felt if Pailong had killed her it would be just punishment. She had had no right to keep someone imprisoned like that, even if she had not been the one to personally commit such a crime as murder. Did he hate her still this morning? Enough to carry out his threat of killing her?  
  
If he did then why had he stayed? Jun moved to the door and swiftly moved into the penthouse suite where she was living with Ren and stopped.  
  
Pailong leant against the wall in a shadowy corner, his massive form folded into the joint of the wall easily. Jun instinctively moved her hand towards where she normally found her command scrolls, remembered she had none this morning, and kept to the opposite side of the room of him. She feared him and his anger from the night before, there was no two ways about it, he had told her he would stay with her but after being attacked she could not help but feel a tingle of fear when he was so close. How could such rage dissapear like it had never existed in the first place? He looked foreboding in the corner, eyes closed, his dead body huge and looming.  
  
Pailong shifted at her presence and said quietly "I will not harm you"  
  
Jun jumped and said, "Who said you would?" she tried to speak like her old self, composed and commanding "I am not afraid of you Pailong"  
  
"Then why keep so far away? Why avert your eyes from me?"  
  
Jun clenched her fist and replied, "I was doing no such thing"  
  
"You aren't even looking here now" Pailong replied from the shadows  
  
Jun grimaced. He was right. She did not want to see him look at her with the loathing she imagined he felt towards her and her family. Jun turned away towards the small kitchen area and busied herself with cooking a piece of toast intent on ignoring the dead man.  
  
Pailong emerged from the shadows, his stitched limbs and grey tinged skin all too visible in the morning light, enough to turn a normal person off theur breakfast but Jun had no such qualms. He cracked his neck of a crick received from his awkward position in the corner and crossed the large sitting area to the counter of the kitchen, opposite Jun. He had been in the corner since the night before when they had returned, even after she had offered him a bed compared to his coffin-like box from before his revival.  
  
"May I help Miss Jun?" he asked politely, his size dwarfing the counter she was cutting bread on  
  
Jun shook her head, turning from him "No. Thank you" she paused "Don't call me Miss Jun. Jun is fine. I don't deserve respect from anyone," she muttered under her breath  
  
The way Li Pailong could now walk around and talk and do anything she could unnerved her. Jun had spent all her life using command scrolls to a dead body and now her lack of control set her on edge. His animated eyes, so dead before, revealing his powerful spirit now watched her carefully.  
  
Jun ate in silence reading the same page of a TV guide over and over, aware of Pailong's eyes on her. Jun felt her face heat up as she finished her food. She turned and washed her plate before moving to return to her bedroom. She wanted to be free of his presence, not understanding the new situation between them fully.  
  
Her way was blocked from the kitchen by Pailong.  
  
"Why don't you look at me Jun?" he asked quietly "If I am to be your guardian spirit should we not at least be able to be in each other's presence for more than a few moments? Should we not be able to look at each other straight?"  
  
Jun made no reply, her heart was beating fast. At her height she could only stare into Li Pailong's chest and she made no effort to look up at his words.  
  
"Look at me Jun" he requested  
  
She could not. Jun focused her eyes on part of a design on his clothes and said nothing. She was afraid of what she would see in those eyes that had so recently become animated and alive with feelings and life, or what could be classed as life. If it was hate in them she would understand. If it was pity then she would feel worse than she did now. If it was anything else...Jun mentally scolded herself, what else could there be hidden within his eyes? But she knew she would not be able to handle anything than hate and pity.  
  
"I as good as killed you by being born" Jun said softly "Why don't you just pass on? It would be for the best, I'm not in the Shaman tournament so I do not need a protector"  
  
"But what about protection from..."  
  
A door opened on the opposite side of the penthouse and Ren emerged, tousled from sleep and yawning widely, in sweatpants and a t-shirt. Jun leapt away from Pailong as if she had been scolded, she had no idea why that reaction occurred but the thought of Ren finding her so close to Pailong when yesterday he had been a lifeless corpse was too much at that moment.  
  
Ren still did not know of Pailong's freedom.  
  
"Good morning Ren" Jun said pleasantly  
  
He scowled at her and came to the kitchen area but found the entrance blocked by Pailong. Ren growled and snapped "Out of my way corpse, Jun move your body to somewhere less irritating"  
  
Pailong turned on Ren and fixed him with a steel gaze before murmuring "So you are another member of the family..." he sized up Ren, who came up to his middle in height "Another soul imprisoned?"  
  
Jun ringed her hands; he did feel bitter about his imprisonment, his voice betrayed his feelings.  
  
Ren's eye's widened "You..." he jumped back a few paces and pointed at Pailong and then at Jun "Jun! He has broken his spell? Cast it again and capture him before he passes over"  
  
Pailong picked up Ren by his t-shirt front and said harshly "You will do no such thing"  
  
Jun jumped forward and grabbed Pailong's arm as Ren struggled against his grip "Don't hurt him, please"  
  
Pailong growled and dropped Ren who, in the process of summoning Basson, stopped his spell and caught his breath as he was dropped to the ground.  
  
"He would not be worth the effort" Pailong muttered and retreated back to his corner of the penthouse, yanking his arm away from Jun's hands roughly.  
  
Jun watched him go and then knelt by Ren, helping him to rise, "Ren..."  
  
Ren scowled "Don't. I know what's happened here, it was that Yoh Asakura wasn't it? He broken your control! You must regain it quickly"  
  
Jun shook her head "I don't want to"  
  
"What?" Ren asked, incredulous  
  
"He said he would stay as my guardian spirit" Jun explained softly, "I want him to stay as he is"  
  
Ren growled "Weakling. You want to 'make friends with your spirit'" he mimicked Yoh's voice in a babyish manner "Jun I expected better from you" he stood up, eyed her distastefully and stormed off to his room, throwing a scowl at Li Pailong, who glared from the corner "You won't be let off easily Jun" he called back  
  
Jun stared after him and leaned her head on the sofa. Everything was so confusing. She closed her eyes, breathing in the scent of the leather of the furniture and listening to the room. If he had been alive, Jun would have heard his breathing.  
  
"Do you truly wish to stay with me?" Jun asked softly  
  
"Yes"  
  
"Why?"  
  
"You are trapped in a web created by your family" Pailong replied "It destroyed me, I cannot let another be destroyed by it also" he paused "I was known as a hero in my lifetime, if I did not try to save someone in need...I would betray that"  
  
"I do not need saving" Jun snapped  
  
"I tried to tell you earlier. Do not think that in my short time awake I still remain ignorant to your situation. You know as well as I that you await punishment and that further failure creates a dire situation for you. I will protect you as is my duty"  
  
Jun felt strangely sad; 'my duty'. Was there no other reason than duty to his reputation? She shook her head, she was being stupid. There would never be another reason for him to stay with his killer.  
  
The phone rang.  
  
Jun froze, her stomach suddenly tying in knots. She looked at the phone as it continued to ring and then at Pailong, her eyes wide. She moved slowly to where the phone lay on the coffee table and hesitated. Pulling herself together she picked it up.  
  
"Hello?"  
  
She listened as someone spoke to her before she nodded her assent "I understand" and put the phone down. Once it was replaced she collapsed on the sofa and burst into tears "They're sending my cousin" she sobbed, "My uncle wants me to return home" her breath caught "They want me to leave Ren"  
  
Pilong said nothing.  
  
"I do not want to leave him" Jun whispered and pulled a pillow into her embrace "He is so young and...our cousin is less lenient than I. It was her father than turned him into" she paused "Such a merciless Shaman. Anything to win...How did we become like this?" she hid her face into her pillow  
  
A hand placed itself on her head and smoothed her hair gently, Jun looked up at Pilong and smiled weakly "Thank you," she said softly and while she cried he stood at her back and kept his hand on the top of her head, offering comfort without intrusion.  
  
Jun woke up several hours later in her bed. She sat up and rubbed her eyes, wondering how she had got into her bed before remembering. She had fallen asleep on the sofa after crying so much. Her eyes felt puffy and sleepy, closing her eyes Jun lay back down.  
  
Li Pailong must have brought her to bed. Jun looked the clock, she had slept until late evening and had missed the whole day. She yawned, in half a mind to go back to sleep and miss the rest of the day but decided against it. Pulling off the cover she tried to smooth her rumpled dress without success. She also found her clips piled on her bedside table, her hair had been taken down to prevent the clips stabbing her head presumably. She touched her hair self-consciously, hair was an intimate thing to her, she never let anyone play with it in her life, somehow the thought of someone touching it was strange.  
  
Had Ren done it it? Or had it been Li Pailong? Somehow the latter idea seemed more acceptable to her. If he was to be her guardian spirit then perhaps the small boundaries she usually felt should be put on hold between them, certainly the other Shaman relationships she had encountered, excepting her brother, were on closer terms of friendship. Pailong wanted to protect her; perhaps she could become friends with him like Yoh was with Amidamaru. The idea was appealing, to become a good team they would need trust and after that friendship didn't seem too far off an idea. He obviously wanted her to be on friendly terms with him, evident by him wishing her to look at him directly rather than avoiding his gaze.  
  
She smiled, it was decided: she would try to be his friend and give it a try to be more like Yoh Asakura. She could do it.  
  
Thanks for reading, please review for me! 


End file.
